Blogging economists draw cyber-crowds

By Emily Kaiser

CHICAGO (Reuters) - To debate leading economists on hot topics like globalization and free trade, you can hang out at Harvard -- or log on to a growing group of brainy blogs.

Blogging, the soap box for the masses, is getting a bit more high-brow as elite professors look to share their views on the issues of the day and interact with an audience that may not spend much time on exclusive college campuses.

"It allows you to reach outside the Ivory Tower," said Daniel Drezner, a professor at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in Medford, Mass. He blogs on global political economics at www.danieldrezner.com/blog/.

A blog debate on free trade between Harvard economists Dani Rodrik and Greg Mankiw attracted thousands of readers to Rodrik's newly launched site, giving non-economists a unique forum to engage some of the biggest names in the business.

Less lofty subjects like Hollywood gossip still trump economics on the blogosphere. A Google blog search for "celebrity" found more than 2.2 million results. The same search for "economics" turned up 674,103 references.

Economic blogs aimed at investors have been hot for some time, with sites such as The Big Picture (http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/) following the market impact of everything from the Federal Reserve to housing. But top-tier professors debating economic theory and political policy online was a bit of a rarity until recently.

Brad DeLong, who teaches economics at the University of California at Berkeley, was one of the first, and still writes regularly at delong.typepad.com/. Mark Thoma, an economics professor at the University of Oregon, writes Economist's View at economistsview.typepad.com/.

WHY BLOG?